


Rage Against The Dying Light

by geckoholic



Category: Hawkeye (Comics), Marvel 616
Genre: Alternate Universe - Circus, Alternate Universe - Journalism, Dreams vs. Reality, F/M, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, M/M, Multi, Semi-Public Sex, Sibling Incest
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-10-31
Updated: 2015-10-31
Packaged: 2018-04-29 05:15:38
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,705
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5116865
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/geckoholic/pseuds/geckoholic
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Clint's a reporter, and Kate's the new blogger they hired. Clint and Kate are in the circus with Barney. It's a dream. It's not.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Rage Against The Dying Light

**Author's Note:**

  * For [andibeth82](https://archiveofourown.org/users/andibeth82/gifts).



> Okay, guys, see. I know this is weird. And I don't know if I'd written this for someone I didn't already know, but since the recipient in this case was my official partner in crime... well. This wanted to happen, and I let it, and here we are. Heeh. 
> 
> Beta-read by scribblemyname, who also helped me brainstorm and held my hand throughout. Thank you!! ♥ All remaining mistakes are mine.
> 
> Title is from "I Want Out" by Young Guns.

Being told what he can or cannot do ranks pretty high on the list of things that ruffle Clint’s feathers. It doesn’t even quite matter whether the discouraging party is right or whether his reaction is at all reasonable; he’s going to be pissed on general principle. He’s petty that way.

So maybe uncovering one cyber scandal of sorts _doesn’t_ mean he’s automatically on top of all things internet. Maybe the online blog that got suggested in the aftermath of that article _would_ better be curated by someone else, even though he wanted to do it himself. Maybe all that is true. He still doesn’t like it. And naturally, that means he also doesn’t plan on falling over his feet in order to roll out the red carpet for the oh-so-promising young woman the paper hired straight out of grad school to write that damn blog in his stead. Except he kinda has to – adding insult to injury, Rogers told him to take her under his wings, show her the ropes, all the bloated phrases he so likes to use.

That is why, on her supposed first day, Clint marches into the office of _The Avengers_ slightly late, with a frown, an already cold coffee-to-go, and a giant chip on his shoulder. She’s waiting at his desk, her hair up in a ponytail, legs crossed as much as her pencil skirt allows, bent over her cell phone, and she looks about fucking twelve.

He dumps his messenger bag and his coffee on the desk – so hard the liquid sloshes and close enough that she needs to shift in order to avoid getting sprinkled – and nods at her attire. “This isn’t the New York Times. No dress code. Jeans would’ve done nicely.”

She stares at him for a few seconds, dumbfounded, but then collects herself and smiles. “I just like to be put together, but noted.” She extends a hand. “Kate Bishop. Nice to meet you.”

Because he wasn’t raised in a barn after all, he takes the offered hand and shakes. “I know. And you know who I am. We both know why you’re here. So, let’s just skip the pleasantries and get right down to business, alright?”

“Okay, bossman.” Kate smiles again and hops off the desk. “Where do we start?”

 

***

 

The first thing Clint does after he’s home is fire up his private laptop and google Kate Bishop's previous work. She _is_ pretty much coming straight from grad school and there’s not much, but what he sees isn’t too bad. In fact, unless someone’s going to try and make him admit it out loud, Clint is willing to concede that while the fact that she was hired at all still pisses him off, the paper could have done a lot worse – and so could he, for that matter. She’s a little cocky – which, okay, he’d be hypocritical if he’d really mark that one down as a character flaw – but she seems smart, ready to listen and learn. Their first day together was all around rather boring, getting her settled, organizing her a keycard for access to the office after hours and a pass to identify her as one of the staff reporters, that kinda thing. It’ll be a week before she’ll have a desk and computer all for herself – either because _The Avengers_ really, really isn’t the New York Times, or because Rogers is a sneaky asshole and wanted to make sure they get ample time to get acquainted before Clint gets a chance to shove her behind her own desk and ignore her existence. Until then, their involuntary team work is going to continue.

He closes the laptop and shoves it across the table with a sigh, before he can be tempted to, like, sniff out her facebook profile and venture straight into stalker territory. Looking her up professionally is well within his rights; everything else would be inappropriate and unfair. The whole situation isn’t her fault.

He relocates from sofa to bed, switches the TV on and sets it on timer, lets the distant babble of an old black-and-white cowboy movie lull him to sleep.

 

***

 

_Kate doesn't do anything halfway, and sex is no exception. She throws herself into it with abandon, lacking any sense of shame, writhes and moans and gives a constant string of inane, whispered dirty talk. But right now, they need to be quiet._

_Clint's got her against a pole in the big top, one of her legs resting on his shoulder while he's kneeling in front of her, sawdust in his nostrils, the two of them only illuminated by the night lights outside of the tent. Her hand is absentmindedly clutching his shoulder; her fingernails are digging into his skin. An arm wrapped around her ass, he can feel the muscles there quivering, imagines how she's biting her lips, desperately trying not to make a sound. They're not supposed to be in here during the night – no one is. Everyone's going to be angry, if they're caught. _Barney_ is going to be angry. He likes them safe and sheltered, as much as that's possible with the life they're living. _

_The first thing she and Clint ever agreed on was that they both thought that's bullshit, and that they'd sneak out from under his watchful eye every chance they'd get. Like tonight: he's out on a job with Duquesne and they're free to do what they want._

_Clint squints up, wanting to memorize what he can see of her face, how her black hair frames it, merging with the darkness surrounding them. She looks down and starts saying his name; he shushes her. Grins at her, because he's just that kind of bastard, and leans back in to lick a slow stripe up her cunt. She groans, but it turns into a frustrated huff halfway through. The hand that's not leaving little crescent moons in the flesh of his shoulder shoots out to swat at his head, and she rolls her hips, bringing herself closer to his face._

_Fun as it might be to rile her up, patience isn't exactly one of his virtues either, and he stops playing around, gently parts her labia with forefinger and thumb and so he can flick his tongue across her clit. They've been at this long enough that she doesn't last long, pushed almost to the brink already. Her fingers are carding though his hair now. She's whispering so low he can't make out any words, his attention admittedly shot, focused solely on the task at hand. Her orgasm is a quiet affair for once, marked only by the way her fingers still, grasp a few strands of his hair and hold firm, an alternative outlet to screaming out her pleasure like she usually does._

 

***

 

Clint blinks awake with his heart in his throat and the afterimage of Kate's long black hair falling down her shoulders in front of his eyes, the outline of her bared neck against the dim light streaming in through the fabric of the tent. 

His whole life, he's never once been to the circus. In the day he’s known her, he didn’t even come close to seeing Kate like _that_. Stupid subconscious.

He shakes his head with some force to make the remnants of the dream go away, and gets out of bed. Quick shower, and then he’s off to work, forgetting to get his coffee on the way, which for once has him arrive on time. Kate is already there, spinning on his office chair.

She’s wearing her hair open today, and Clint strangely isn’t surprised to find out it’s the exact same length as he saw in his dream. Also, she’s taken yesterday’s jab to heart, points to her loose-fitting jeans as soon as their eyes meet and grins. Clint’s confused enough to grin back, at least until he catches himself. He clears his throat and pushes the chair with her on it out of the way, bends down to boot up his computer and check his emails.

There’s the usual internal chatter about meetings that don’t concern him and projects he has no interest in joining, most of which he marks as read and discards, and a few shouty emails from readers that think they’ve uncovered the story of the century. But at the bottom of the pile, sent around midnight, he sees an anonymous email that _could_ be bullshit but is just cryptic enough to catch his attention. If he’s reading it correctly, it’s suggesting a meetup, the kind that doesn’t require rsvp; you either show up and grab your chance or you don’t. He scribbles the contents of the email on a post-it, then on another slightly changed, playing around with possible codes until he figures out a when and a where.

“Alright,” he says, turning to look at Kate. “Wanna see how real journalism works?”

She stops spinning, pulls her upper lip between her teeth and nods eagerly. He tries not to compare that expression to the one dream-Clint pictured her wearing while he was on his knees, eating her out.

 

***

 

They’ve been waiting in the public garage beneath the office building across the street for half an hour now, and Clint can sense how another little piece of Kate’s faith in his knowledge and experience evaporates with every passing moment. He can relate; he’s not trusting it too much anymore either, right now. Another fifteen minutes, and then he’s going to admit defeat. Win some, lose some. It’s part of the job.

That’s when he sees the van on the far end of the deck turn his lights up twice in quick succession. He elbows Kate and takes off towards the van, falling into a jog when the driver starts the engine and maneuvers out of the parking space. Even so, the van’s gone before they can reach it, and Kate turns to run after it, but Clint touches her shoulder, signaling to stay put. If they’d wanted a chase, they’d made sure Clint and Kate would’ve had a car too and be able to follow. He searches the now vacated space, and sure enough: he spots a small envelope, iconspicuous if it weren’t for its very existence, nestled into the corner. He bends down to pick it up, pockets it, and ushers Kate towards the elevator so they can get out of here.

If their mysterious messenger doesn’t want to hang around, they shouldn’t either, Clint’s sure. 

He doesn't open the envelope until they're safely back at _The Avengers_ , Kate hovering over his shoulder, trying to get the best possible look at its contents the second he takes them out: a couple of court documents, land and company register, that kinda thing, and a typed note with another time and date, the words “watch from safe distance” scribbled underneath. 

Holding the note up and waving it a bit, Clint grins at Kate. “Did you have any plans for tonight?”

 

***

 

_He's lying in the grass next to the field that borders on their pitch for the week, the ground underneath him warm but slightly damp; he's going to be soiled when he gets up, but he doesn't care. He’s staring up at the sky and the fluffy, perfect white clouds that pass them by, and listens to Kate talk about the city. It’s where she was born; where they found her, all those years ago. The city in Kate’s memories probably doesn’t have a lot in common with the real thing, but Clint doesn’t mind. Her stories are fun regardless, because Kate is a good storyteller. They’re close enough that her shoulders and arms brush his, and he can feel her every move. She’s making daisy chains, not to wear them, but to keep her hands busy._

_“Barney thinks that if you had to choose one of us, it would be me,” she says, conversationally, like it's not a loaded statement at all._

_“Did he tell you that?” Clint asks, turning his head to look at her._

_She doesn’t meet his eyes, focused on knitting together an endless chain of small flowers. “He didn’t have to. I know. It’s obvious.”_

_Not to Clint, but then again, he tries not to think about it. He loves them both. They both love him, and they love one another, albeit differently. He can’t imagine a life without _either_ Kate or Barney. There is no choice, except for all three of them to stay together. “What do you think?”_

_“I think that I love you too much to ever ask you to pick one of us,” Kate replies. “And so does he.” She finally turns, and her expression is similar to the one she wears when she’s given a new task and tries to figure out the best way to go about it. “But there was a time when it was just you and him. He knows how it feels to have you all to himself. I don’t.”_

_There’s not much Clint remembers from his childhood. Yelling and tears, pain and fear, and Barney keeping him safe. It’s as if his life didn’t really start until they ran away, found comfort in each other, and then, not long after, found Kate. But he wouldn’t know how to put any of that into words, make her understand._

_“I love you too,” he says instead, rolling onto his side and nuzzling the side of her face, until she sighs, drops the flowers, and turns. She opens up to him as easily as she always does, and he closes his eyes while they kiss, breathes her in._

_They only stop when they hear Barney’s voice, calling them home, telling them to haul their asses into the trailer and get ready – the anchor that tethers them to steady ground, reminds them that there’s a world beyond their little circle of three, the same way it’s always been._

 

***

 

An elbow to the ribs wakes him rather rudely. “Hey, Barton. Naptime's over. Look.”

“What?” Clint straightens up, having slid down in the driver’s seat when he drifted off, and rubs his eyes. Seeing Kate in the here and now, right after that dream, looking the same and yet not at all, is strangely surreal.

She points at the town house they’re here to observe. It had been quiet and uneventful before he nodded off, but now the lights are on in front of it, two men in business wear talking animatedly. Professionalism takes over, and suddenly Clint’s wide awake, reaching into the backseat to fumble around for his camera. The zoom manages to turn the vague silhouettes into actual people with distinct features, and as he releases the shutter again and again, he thinks he’s recognizing at least one of them. Safely hidden, he takes a couple more pictures, to be safe. Once he’s done, he takes the memory card out and hands them to Kate.

“Upload these to the paper’s online server,” he instructs. Upon seeing the questioning expression on her face, he adds, “Can’t be too careful, right?”

Kate shrugs and does as she’s told, inserting the card into her tablet and swiping this way and that, while Clint starts the car and sets on getting them back to the office. His gaze keeps straying to her, taking in her profile, which seems so eerily familiar; his subconscious sure is doing a number on him here.

After a little while, he takes a breath, his fingers tightening around the steering wheel, and gives in. “Do you know someone named Barney?”

Kate looks up from her tablet and frowns. “Uh, no. Why would I?”

Clint shakes his head, feeling stupid. “No reason.”

They drive the rest of the way to the office in awkward silence, and after they deposit the memory card in a lockable compartment in Clint’s desk, he drops her off at the address she gives him and heads home. It’s past midnight at this point, and Clint forgoes food and shower in favor of face-planting right into bed for a short night of fitful, but dreamless sleep.

 

***

 

When Kate arrives the next morning, Clint's already been in the office for an hour or two, and he's got some progress to show for it: he went through last night's photos again, played with magnifier and lighting, and figured out why one of the men looked familiar. He's sitting on the city council. The other's still a mystery, but Clint fed the photos to a contact with the police, and he's waiting for her to call back.

Kate grins when she walks up to the desk and sits down on the wooden surface, like she did the first day. "Dog with a bone, huh?"

"I just like puzzles," he says, motioning at the screen. "And I'm good at them."

She hums in appreciation. "So we've got something to go on?"

"Not much yet," he concedes. "But it's a start. The rest is on us, good old investigative journalism."

“By which you mean...?” Kate inclines her head, clearly calling bullshit, and Clint grins. 

“Shaking all the trees we can come up with,” he says. “Until we've found the one our rotten apple fell from.” 

The eyeroll that happens in response is extremely satisfying. “Aren't you just a fountain of professionalism.” 

He beckons her closer and clicks another window on his browser so that it shows his work email. “I sent out a few interview inquires to city officials and requests for information and statements from city hall . Most of them will be ignored or politely declined, but it's worth a try. I've got someone on identifying the other dude. Really, right now, it's a waiting game.”

She looks – well, not exactly reassured, but less like she's wondering just who he slept with to get this job. 

 

***

 

_Kate is out practicing something or other – unlike the two of them she's no one-trick-pony, picks up skills wherever she can, absorbing them like a sponge – and Clint and Barney have grabbed the opportunity. Neither of them cares that it's the middle of the day and the door's not locked, because in the circus the doors are never locked. Anyone could come in find them like this. Find them underneath the covers, Clint's back pressed to his brother's chest, arm thrown back to clutch at Barney's hip, direct him as he moves behind him, _in_ him, face buried into the crook of Clint's neck, breathing hard, murmuring his name, chanting it really, like an incantation. _

_If it were one, an incantation, Clint's not sure whether its purpose would be to conjure something up or ban something from this plane of existence. Because when they're like this, Barney's as desperate and borderline angry as he's gentle, worshipful, every time. Then again, that's pretty much standard Barney: barely contained fury, bundled up in protectiveness and self-loathing, volatile, a disaster waiting to happen. Clint has always been both the fuse on his bomb and the safety on his trigger. The only thing that's different, when they're fucking, is that he also feels like the target of all that anger. And in all honesty, it only makes this_ better _._

_He pushes back against the warm weight of his brother's body, rewarded with a hard thrust that steals his breath away, puts him right on the edge, and because he's always been a brat he does it again, and again, until Barney's hands fly up to grip Clint's shoulders with enough force that a bolt of pain shoots up his spine like lightning, immobilizing him, and that's when Barney bottoms out, having them come together like the deeply entangled, perfectly synchronized mess that they are._

_Barney pulls out and moves away the second he's caught his breath, sits up, and Clint can feel his gaze crawling over his skin, love and disdain and silent apology all rolled into one._

_“Get dressed,” he commands, voice toneless and neutral. “Before she's back.”_

_“Why?” asks Clint, even though he knows what this is about, knows all about it. He turns, helpfully, so Barney can glare at him better. “Not like it'd be news to her.”_

_And glare Barney does, looking at Clint a little bit like he considers him to be mentally deficient._

_“Well, she doesn't need to_ see _it,” he snarls, and Clint wonders who he's aiming to protect this time – preserving Kate's innocence or their privacy._

 

***

 

Clint's eyes fly open and he scrambles out of the bed, his chest heaving. It's not so much the _guy_ thing – he's always considered himself, at the very least, bi-curious – but the _brother_ thing. Dreams about Kate, well okay, those he can take. She's young, but she's an adult he's not related to. She's pretty. She's funny. She's smart. The dreams would make it weird, now, but he could've gotten behind that. 

He doesn't have a brother, but if he did, he's pretty sure he'd rather take a head-dive into boiling lava than _sleep with him_. He feels sick. Lightheaded. A little bit like someone punched him in the stomach. His skin is tingling where dream-Clint allowed himself to be touched by his own flesh and blood. 

Shaking his head to get rid of the memory, he glances at the clock; he overslept, didn't even hear his alarm. His cell phone rings, and his heart almost misses a beat at the sound of his ring tone suddenly filling the room, and he hurries to retrieve it from his night stand. 

“Where are you?” asks Kate after he's taken the call, without preamble. She sounds worried, and it makes her sound more like the Kate from his dreams – the one he loves and who loves him, and who's perfectly fine with him fucking his brother. 

He shakes his head again. “Still at home. I was about to call in. I'm not feeling well.” 

In more than ten years with _The Avengers_ , he's hardly taken enough sick days to fill a whole week, but the thought of spending the whole day with her, after that dream, makes bile rise in his throat. Being with her makes them more real, impossible to ignore. 

“But the case – “ 

“You can handle it,” Clint cuts in. “All that's left to do is a little bit of leg work. You've got this.” 

He doesn't give her a chance to argue, ends the call before she can get another word in edgeways. Instead of calling in sick, he emails Rogers and turns the laptop off right after. Neither one of them is gonna be happy. He couldn't care less. 

There are sleeping pills in the bathroom cabinet, for all the times he got so wrapped up in a case that eating or sleeping or basic human hygiene became a secondary concern. Finding the right brand had required a bit of experimenting, but by now he's found one that knocks him out clean, and, most importantly, puts him under far enough that there won't be anything else than deep blackness in his dreams. In this situation, that's exactly what he needs. 

 

***

 

Judging by the staccato rhythm his poor doorbell is subjected to when he opens his eyes next, the person pressing it has been waiting for a while. Clint rubs his eyes, his mind slow to dig its way back to consciousness. 

“Alright, alright, coming” he yells as he stands to make his way over to the hallway and let them in. 

Kate's face is a little red, her eyes wide, when he opens the door. Clint steps into her path, but she pushes right past him, into the apartment. “About fucking time, I was about to call an ambulance.” 

“News of my death have been greatly exaggerated.” He must look about as shitty as he feels, because she frowns at him, concern deepening. “I'm fine. Should've thrown away the Chinese takeout from last week, though, instead of eating it.” 

Now she looks slightly disgusted. “I was on my way to the city council for a statement, thought I'd swing by, see if you're okay or maybe want to join – “

Clint shakes his head; regrettable move, because it brings a distant pounding in the back of his skull to his attention. “Not quite there yet.” 

Her eyes travel up and down his body, taking in the whole miserable picture. “Are you sure you're okay?” 

Considering she's known him for hardly a week, Kate can see through his bullshit pretty well. Or maybe it's just that obvious: he's not fine. He's nowhere close. Now that he's awake, the images from the dreams are back again, like a slightly oily second layer to reality, making everything around him blurry. Maybe he's going insane. 

That's certainly the reason he'll cite for what happens next, how he takes a step forward to close the distance between them, all but crowding her against the wall, closes his eyes and leans in. It feels right and familiar; she even smells the way he remembers, faintly like lilacs. 

Kate gasps and steps back, ducking away from him. “What the _fuck_ , Barton?” 

The aghast tone of her voice is what pulls him back into the here and now, the monumental stupidity of that move crashing in on him like waves in a storm from every angle. He runs a hand down his face and spins on his socked heels. “I'm so sorry. I didn't mean to – shit, I don't know what I was thinking.” 

“We're chalking that one up to food poisoning.” She conjures up a smile, but it looks strained and disingenuous. “Let's forget it ever happened.” 

She takes another step backwards before she turns and heads for the door, not facing him as she mumbles her goodbyes and lets herself out. He slides the door chain back in place and scuffles back to bed. There's enough sleeping pill magic still in his system to have him fall back asleep within less than a minute, but not enough to keep away the dreams. 

 

*** 

 

_These days, Clint's acts alternate: sometimes with Kate, sometimes with Barney, sometimes all three. But Barney's lacking a few extra skills the other two picked up, his time stretched thin between the circus and the things he does after dark. Too old a dog already to learn new tricks, he says. Besides, the audience likes Kate better, and what the audience wants goes._

_Clint's standing on the wire – not that long a walk, and owed more to the fact that he doesn't possess a fear of heights than to actual talent, and anyway, the wire isn't the point – and glances down to Barney, standing behind the curtain with his arms crossed. Barney isn't looking at him, though. He's looking at Kate. Kate, who's standing on the ground, bow at the ready, concentration honed in on the task awaiting her. It's only when he seem to sense Clint's gaze on him that he looks his way. Gives him a thumbs up and a smile, but Clint can read his brother's face like a book: the deep line, the lack of crinkles around the eyes even when the lips try to say happy and unconcerned. They're out of synch, and Clint can't figure out why. It's been like this for years; nothing has changed._

_But the trumpet goes, and they're announced, and Clint can't think about that right now. His fingers close tighter around the bow in his hand – the audience will think he's only took it with him up here to keep his balance. He's not nervous. He's done this a hundred times._

_He takes a first step onto the wire, a second, a third. The room is perfectly silent, spellbound and watching every intake of breath, every muscle shift. He feints left, pretends to loose his balance, rights himself. Kate looks up, meets his eyes. He nods. She takes aim and shoots, the metal wire coming loose with a snap. Clint can hear the collective gasp from the audience, and jumps, turning his body around in the air, and aims himself, at the pole he just stepped off from. He knocks and releases in one smooth motion. The arrow shoots out, and with it a piece of rope that he's supposed to catch. That he usually does catch, every time._

_But as he falls, during those precious seconds he's got to save himself from falling onto the sawdust in the ring, his thoughts drift back to Barney's sad, insincere smile._

_Clint lets the bow sail to the ground and reaches for the rope. He misses._

 

*** 

 

Good news is, Clint finds upon waking, that the nausea is gone. Instead his heart beats a wild rhythm in his chest, and his whole body feels stiff and strange, like he slept for much longer than the hour or two since Kate left. He experimentally rubs his temples. The headache is still there. 

He considers to just put this whole episode aside and make the sleeping pills his new best friend until further notice. It's afternoon now, golden rays of light streaming in through the curtains in his bedroom, and he could just go to the office, apologize to Kate, and move on. 

That's not what he does. 

He pulls on yesterday's clothes and grabs his car keys. His parents live a few miles outside of the city, own a nice townhouse in the suburbs, had it since he was a little boy. He needs to make sense of this, somehow, and the reporter in him has a template for that: formulate questions and find the right people to get answers. There's no way he'd get any of those out of Kate right now, not after what he pulled earlier, and that leaves looking into Barney. 

His mother is over the moon to find her son on the doorstep out of nowhere, ushers him inside, puts on coffee, produces a bowl full of cookies from that magical space where she always keep some sort of homemade baked goods. Clint almost regrets the interrogation he's about to spring on her, but the buzzing, alien feeling underneath his skin is more powerful than the guilt. 

“Mom,” he says, and she beams at him. “Do I – did I ever have a brother?” 

Her brows knit together. She reaches out to cup his cheek. “No, honey. What makes you think that?” 

He leans away from her touch. “But I am, uh... I'm yours, right? I'm not adopted or anything?” 

“I laid in labor with you for nearly sixteen hours.” She tenses, folds her hands in her lap, inclines her head. He’s got her worried, and he’s not even sorry. Maybe that should worry _him_. “You know that.” 

Yes, he knows that; whenever his father gets a few drinks to many into his system at family get-togethers, he tells the story of how he took her to the hospital and how he drove the doctors nuts and almost missed the actual birth of his only son because he was busy arguing with a nurse in the hallway. 

Nevertheless, he presses on. “Do we know anyone called Barney? Childhood friend? Old neighbor? Second cousin?” 

Her expression doesn't change, neither does her tone of voice when she replies. “No. We do not. Tell me, sweetie, what's this about?” 

Clint doesn't answer; he's got a new idea, rushes up the stairs to his old bedroom, his mother on his heels. He ignores her, digs out the box containing school yearbooks and photo albums from birthday parties and class trips. She looks on while he upends it, flips through book after album, carelessly throwing them by the wayside once he's one with one and taking the next. 

There's no Barney. There's not one face that even looks the faintest bit like him, even accounting for a younger age. He _remembers_ what Barney looked like as a kid. If he were somewhere in these pictures, he'd _know_. 

Once he's done, he wordlessly rises to his feet, hurries back downstairs, and leaves his mother standing in the hallway with her hands folded in front of herself, calling after him. 

 

***

 

He knows the route from his parent's home back to the city by heart. Clint's a bit of a nomad, moving every couple of years, but he's taken some variation of this drive countless times in more than a decade. 

And yet, he doesn't get far. 

The intersection is never busy, unless there's a traffic jam on the nearby highway and people who only know this area from a map are trying to be smart. He looks down for only a few seconds, checking his phone for emails because he's decided to head to the office after all and wants to know how much yelling he can expect, but it's enough. 

A station wagon crashes into the drivers side with near impossible force, and Clint gets to catalog the unreal sensation of feeling several bones break at once for a few seconds. Then the lights go out and there's nothing anymore, no feeling, no pain, no thought. 

 

***

 

The first thing that registers after Clint wakes is the sound of hushed voices, Barney and Kate, arguing at the other end of the trailer. It's oddly comforting, familiar, reassuring. His whole body aches, muscles locked up and stiff from disuse, and his head throbs, the kind of pressure that ebbs and flows with the rhythm of his pulse. He knows without having to be told that he's been unconscious for a while – days, maybe weeks. He's not hurting, though, although he feels that should be the case. 

Barney and Kate fall silent and turn almost simultaneously. She's the first to dart to his bedside and kneel down next to him. 

“There you are,” she says, brushes her thumb along his forehead and leans down to kiss the space she's just touched. “We missed you.” 

“Yes,” Barney adds, now also crouching down beside him. “You gave us such a scare. What are we supposed to do without you?” 

Clint clears his throat, ineffectively. All he manages is a croaked _I_ , then he has to admit that speaking isn't on the menu yet. But he smiles, wide and relieved, and he hopes it conveys everything he can't say. 

He missed them too. He'd never want to leave. He's glad to be back with them.


End file.
